


agyana

by toujours_nigel



Category: Mahabharata - Vyasa
Genre: M/M, Sibling Incest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-04
Updated: 2019-06-04
Packaged: 2020-04-07 23:30:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19095226
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/toujours_nigel/pseuds/toujours_nigel
Summary: 5 times Karna/Arjuna were a thing





	agyana

“I thought you would be furious,” Yudhishtira said after everything was over, and only the bruises remained to remind Arjuna of his great feats.  
“I am. I simply do not scream and shout like Vrikodara.”  
“I do not know,” Yudhishtira mused, “whether I’m getting better at spotting lies, or you worse at telling them.”  
“Shall I forever behave as I did at fourteen, to please you? If it were the Nishad again I would not let him be mutilated.”  
Yudhishtira hummed equably, and then caught Arjuna by the scruff of the neck as he had when they were children and said, “Out with it.”  
“I had him. Vasusena. Two nights ago when he first returned to the city. Don’t comfort or console me, it’ll go badly for us both.”  
“You didn’t know he was competing,” Yudhishtira observes. “He didn’t tell you.”  
“I’m not such a fool as to bed a man who wishes to kill me,” Arjuna spat. “He said nothing of it.”  
“He  _is_  a comely man,” Yudhishtira offered after a moment that stretched long and silent. “Would you chance it again?”  
“Not in all my days,” Arjuna said fervently. “Even if I wished it, he’s Duryodhan’s creature now.”

* * *

“Not your year as her husband,” Vasusena asked, though it was obvious enough, with Panchali retiring and him still in his seat as the hall emptied out.  
Still, it had been a pleasant enough day if overlong, Duryodhana’s wedding-feast filling stomachs and Princess Bhanumati’s smile rejoicing hearts. She was nothing Arjuna would have thought of for him, but it was plain to anyone that he was already besotted. A strange thing, to see Duryodhana greedy for aught but power.  
“Not my year as her husband,” he said.  
“They ought at least have allowed you the first year,” Vasusena grumbled, just as though they were or had ever been friends. “It is all strange to me.”  
“There are precedents,” Arjuna bit out. It was strange still to him as well, that the bride he had won three months ago was to be his sister-in-law for four years. It did not bear confessing.  
“I’ve heard,” Vasusena conceded, and looked up from his contemplation of the floor. “It is strange to me that one could look at you with love and then look away.”  
“You did,” Arjuna retorted.  
“I did,” Vasusena agreed, and turned his hand palm-up. “Will you let me look again?”

* * *

“We will let Vibhatsu deal with him,” Sahadeva said, raising his voice up and out of the knot of whispering into which the twins and Yudhishtira had clustered with Dhaumya.  
“Who will Partha have to deal with,” their mother queried. At her side Draupadi batted her lovely lashes in mockery of the obvious favouritism of the name that ought have had three claimants and instead belonged to him alone.  
He grimaced back at her, and then—realising the whispers had quietened—asked, “Well, who is it? I refuse if it is Shisupal come hoping we’ll shelter him from Shyam again.”  
“It is Vasusena with the elephants our cousins promised us,” Yudhishtira said. “It ought have been Yuyutsu who accompanied them, I cannot think why it is him instead.”  
“It is an insult,” Bhima snarled. “To send us that Sutaputra, instead of...”  
“A Shudrani’s son? Peace, brother,” Arjuna said, and rose smoothly from his seat. “I will see to things.”  
There was silver in Vasusena’s dark hair, and he spoke of his elephants with quiet love, passing on instructions about the pregnant cows, the wily bull.  
At sunset he said, “I leave at dawn. Partha, I will not ask you.”  
“Yes.”

* * *

“Your son is delightful,” Vasusena said, tossing his bow to Arjuna and beginning to yank arrows out of the target they had nearly torn to pieces.  
Arjuna did not need to replenish his divine quiver, but nor was he willing to reveal such a prize to one such as Vasusena who was still completely a creature of the Kauravas.  
Instead he said, “It is a Yadava trait, perchance. Krishna has even befriended Prince Rukmi; they play chess through letters now, when even a decade ago all Rukmi wanted was his head on a platter.”  
Vasusena laughed. “I can well believe it. But I was speaking of your other son.”  
“I am accustomed to thinking of Srutakarma as solemn.”  
“Like a miniature sage,” he agreed. “He deigned to find my thumb satisfactory fodder; I thought I had best leave before Guru Drona discovered the matter.”  
“Were you with us then?”  
“Skulking at the edges; truly, I would rather my thumb than Parashurama’s fee. Come, Partha, the quiver.”  
Arjuna reached out and instead took Vasusena’s hand in his own, remembering the jagged edges of Ekalavya’s hand, the bone showing white, the bloodied knife; he almost tasted blood on Vasusena’s calloused archer’s palm.

* * *

“Come meet my sons,” Vasusena said the second day they were in Hastinapuri, and Arjuna went with him half-unwilling. Nine sons, the youngest about Abhimanyu’s age, perhaps some months younger; the eldest sixteen and of a height with his father.  
“I do not often bring them to Hastinapuri. Vrishasena will be crowned in time; I would not have him Lakshman’s servant.”  
“As you are his father’s?”  
“Duryodhana is my heart in another body; I am less his servant than you Yudhishtira’s. But I must find my sons some Guru other than Drona, some place in the world out of Hastinapuri’s shadow. I’ve surprised you.”  
“You could have left; you still could.”  
“Could you leave Yudhishtira if he wronged you or Panchali? Nobody knows me as well as him, not even my Vrishali. If he is wicked, am I less?”  
“No, you’re worse. You’ve conspired to kill us with no reason and no benefit.”  
“I  _will_  kill you, someday, or you’ll kill me,” Vasusena replied, calm as though they were discussing the next day’s hunt. “One can only postpone destiny, never escape it.”  
“But not today.”  
“No,” Vasusena agreed, smiling, light limning his grey hair. “Only Kama’s arrows for you tonight.”


End file.
